White Pass hopes to reopen Friday
November 17, 2009 by Scott Sandsberry
YAKIMA, Wash. — The weather, weirdly enough, is doing what most winter-sports lover love: That is, it’s fairly nice in the lowlands and dumping up in the high country, where those downhill and cross-country ski trails live.
That bodes well for a Friday reopening at White Pass Ski Area.
“It’s snowing right now, so it’s looking good for Friday to reopen,” White Pass marketing director Kathleen Goyette said this morning. “The weather’s been interesting. It’s feeling pretty warm down in Yakima; it’s been unusual watching the weather patterns.”
Goyette referenced the Monday rainstorm that dumped on Mount Baker, forcing that ski area east of Bellingham — which routinely has the region’s deepest snowpack — to close for today, with tentative plans to reopen Wednesday. The fact that Mount Baker’s storm brought water instead of fresh snow, though, gives pause to the folks at White Pass.
“With us not that far away and getting snow, this weather system — that’s why we’re not saying absolutely for sure (on the possibility of a Friday reopening),” Goyette said. “Things have been pretty unsettled.”
Last weekend’s opener was the one of the earliest openings ever at White Pass. The earliest was Nov. 4 in 1994.
– Scott Sandsberry
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